Across Time and Space
by Alex Mcpherson
Summary: The USS Enterprise, NCC-1701-E detects anomalous readings in a star system supposedly uninhabited, and uncover a 200 year-old mystery.


**Across Time and Space**

_Bridge; USS Enterprise, NCC-1701-E; Maluria System; 2378;_

Captain Picard stood looking out at the planet displayed on the viewscreen. An overlay highlighted a location on the planet.

"I thought this planet was uninhabited?" Riker asked.

"Indeed, sir." Data began, "The sensors are detecting no inhabitant lifeforms beyond local vegetation and associated insect life... Cloud cover is shifting, I can gain a overhead visual in twenty point three seconds."

24 seconds after he said it, the viewscreen changed to show... "A log cabin?" Riker asked in shock.

"A very old one sir." Data agreed, "Odd, my sensors are only detecting the anomalous energy readings, not this, log cabin."

"Riker, prepare an away team."

--

_Maluria IV_

A small distance from the cabin, in the woods, four figures appeared in a sparkle of lights. As the lights faded, the figures were already moving.

Wearing the grey-on-black standard Starfleet uniform, the tall bearded man in the lead wore a red undershirt, visible reaching up onto his neck, with 3 gold pips visible. Just slightly behind and to his side, holding open a tricorder, was a gold-skinned guy with a yellow undershirt and 2 gold and 1 black pips visible. Behind them, a blue-undershirted black-eyed woman was frowning at the pair ahead, walking alongside another woman, whom wore the yellow undershirt and was holding a phaser out.

Riker spoke up, "Alright Data, what do you have?"

"I 'have' nothing, sir." Data replied, slight emphasis on the 'have'. "The cabin still refuses to show on any sensors except optical-based ones."

Amused, Lt Commander Troi commented, "Refuses? I don't sense the cabin to be alive, Data."

"I beg your pardon, I was-"

"I know." She looked at Riker, who was trying to hold a smirk off of his face, succeeding only in so far as that she couldn't see his amusement, but the half-betazoid certainly felt it.

She looked ahead to the cabin that they were slowly approaching. "It's odd, I can sense, something... but it's as though what I'm sensing is at the ranges of what I can sense." Seeing their curious and confused looks, she added, "If it were hearing, it would be like something on the high or low end of our ears' perception. Just there to detect, but not identify."

Finally, they reached the cabin. Riker ran a hand over the wooden rail, then looked at his dust-covered hand. "It's been untouched for a long time." He looked at the part of the rail his hand had touched, seeing quite clearly the difference of grey dust-covered to the stain of old vanish on the dark wood.

"anything yet?"

Data was working his way slowly closer, moving around the cabin, looking intently at his tricorder as he answered, "No, sir. I can't..." He stopped as, a foot away from the cabin, his tricorder beeped. He stepped back, then forward again. "Ah, it has been shielded from external detection. I am inside the field now," He was that one-foot-distance again, "and detecting the cabin, and items inside. There is no one present, and I believe I can override the security on the door." He looked up and walked over and up the stairs to the porch, and they following, entered behind him as he overrode some computer and opened the door.

Inside, they were rather shocked at the obviously human influence, and the old photographs that dotted the place.

"I believe this used to be the domicile of a human." Data supplied with an eyebrow raised.

Lights began to come on, and Riker drew his phaser upon seeing the same response from Data.

Suddenly, though, they found themselves on the bridge of the Enterprise, in front of a rather shocked Captain Picard.

"Ah... sir...?"

--

_Briefing Room; USS Enterprise NCC-1701-E_

"There has been no record of any human inhabitant," Data was saying, "However I found old records from the beginning of the Federation, that indicated that a Vulcan and one other of indeterminate race did in fact, ah, 'Retire' to Maluria IV. The entry was remarkably incomplete on the subject."

"Who was clearly human." Troi explained. "I believe I know now what it was that I sensed as we approached. Data...?"

"Ah yes. On reviewing the logs on my tricorder, I discovered something rather remarkable. A faint reading, an indeterminate lifesign some distance below the cabin."

"I believe I was sensing a human in stasis." Troi finished. "And that it was only faint due to both the distance and the materials and _shields_ between him or her, and myself."

Data nodded, affirming it matched his own data and theories. "However what is odd, is that from what we saw before we were transported out, was that the Human and Vulcan were from the 22nd century. Given the record in the archive, they settled only a few years after the formation of the Federation itself."

Riker spoke up, "What I'd like to know is where they got the technology clearly installed down there. Transporters that beamed us back here _faster_ than our own, _through_ the Enterprise' shields at that, and the sensor jamming technology that prevents even our sensors from scanning it... and the logic of having that completely hide the cabin, when just looking at it found it."

"Also the Weather-patterning technology," Data added, "I have already observed weather patterns that are not natural."

Picard nodded, "It would seem that the pair of settlers liked their privacy."

"I have already uploaded a visual record of a picture of the human I saw before we were beamed aboard. The computer is already running it through the database looking for matches."

--

_Holodeck 2_

The crew were gathered in the holodeck, a program running but frozen.

Riker looked around the bridge of the Enteprise NX-01, as it appeared just prior to it's decommissioning.

A slightly-aged Captain Archer sat in the Captains chair

The British weapons officer, Lieutenant Malcolm Reynolds, sat at the starboard side weapons station.

A young black spacer helmsman was at the helm, Ensign Travis Mayweather.

The young asian communications officer, Ensign Hoshi Sato, was sat at a port-side station in line with Travis.

But it was the pair sat together at the port-side science station that intrigued the group.

A female Vulcan in the uniform of the United Earth Space Probe Agency's Starfleet division, with the rank of Commander, smiling slightly at the human male, also in UESPA-SF's uniform, of the Lieutenant rank, who had just told a joke to the amused crew, when the program was frozen.

"A Smiling Vulcan." Data spoke, his emotion chip on allowing him the truly amused grin of a man who got the joke and appreciated the sight of Vulcan, smiling.

"That's T'Pol." Riker shared. "First Officer of the NX-01 Enterprise, given a commission in the UESPA's Starfleet in 2153 after an attack on Earth. I don't recognise the Lieutenant, however."

Data spoke up. "The records of the NX-01's Crew roster are incomplete for the many years prior to the formation of the Coalition of Planets, however enough data is available that his position on the ship is at least on record, though not his identity. He is the ships' Counsellor, what little record available gives that he joined the crew approximately 1 year after its launch, although curiously records also indicate that the Enterprise had not returned to Earth any time around his joining. No record to indicate his passage on any other vessel from Earth, especially given that his name isn't on record."

"So the NX-01's ships' Counsellor just appears on the ship, and is refered to in what records we _do_ have, as...?" Picard asked.

"Mentioned as 'ships' counsellor', or as the holosimulations suggest, his name never spoken to or about him."

Riker looked at Troi, only she shot him down at the look on his face, "Don't even mention it, Ships First Officer."

Data chuckled and continued, "His record on the ship after the formation of the Coalition of Planets, does indicate that he had significant effect on events. Observed skills include a possible natural skill with weapons, likely extensive training. Diplomatic skills almost rivalling Captain Archers', and prior to the formation of the Federation, an unprecedented ability to improvise, which only was matched by the crew of the NX-01, and only eventually surpassed by Captain Kirk of the 23rd Century."

"Looks like you-" Riker was stopped from making the joke when Troi hit him, on the arm. But Hard. Wincing he said, "Alright, no jokes."

Data had to throw in, "I believe you will be relegated to the coach for the next week, sir."

Picard coughed. "If you two could hold off your lovers' quarrel until you're off duty," He smirked at them, then more seriously, asked, "What happened to Commander T'Pol, after the Decommissioning of the NX-01?"

"No record available, captain."

"She could be the one who left for the planet." Riker suggested.

Troi looked closely at the pair, and nodded.

Data continued, "Her physical condition that meant her control over her emotions was not quite as strong as the average Vulcans'. She had learned to live with her emotions during her time on the Enterprise. It was after leaving the Enterprise that she completely disappeared from record. It is very much possible, that she did so to Maluria IV, with the ships' counsellor whom we know had done so."

Troi shared, "With how difficult it must have been to live with her emotions on the Enterprise, among other Vulcans or even other races would have been far more difficult. It would have been... logical, to retire to an isolated planet no one visited."

Data nodded, then frowned. "Correction. Aside from the vessel that would have left them here, one other vessel visited the planet. The vessel that surveyed the planet, in 2152."

"This ship?"

"Approximately around the time that the Ships' Counsellor appeared, yes sir."

--

_Underground, Maluria IV_

Deep beneath the rock, in a small cave lowly lit, was a stasis chamber, and an inactive device of unknown origin. The Federation would call it, a Guardian of Forever.

The inhabitants of a different yet familiar planet would call it a Quantum Mirror.

Both would have been correct.

--

_Authors Note:_ Little Stargate/Star Trek bunny that struck me. Daniel stranded on another planet again, in another dimension, again. Only this time, he's in another time period... Again.

Admittedly, the part that makes it a 'gate bunny is the second-to-last line. Just threw it in so you wouldn't think it was a Se-*cough*-ert.

That and I wanted to feature my favourite crew too. (TNG lot.)

No I won't be working on it, because to do so, would be making a true gate/trek crossover, when the story was meant to simply be a Se-*cough*-ert story. And you know those are bad ideas for posting, in so far as quality is expected. Which is why I set the crossover status to just TNG/ENT. So you don't _have_ to see it as a gate crossover. :P


End file.
